Taiwan will safeguard its national interests both domestically and internationally should the US lead a war against Iraq, Ministry of Foreign Affairs Eugene Chien (
"If this war takes place, we have to safeguard our interests domestically and overseas," Chien said at the ministry.
Chien made the statement followed US Secretary of State Colin Powell's report on Wednesday to a special session of the UN Security Council on Baghdad's alleged weapons programs and links to terrorist groups.
"Both the Presidential Office and the Executive Yuan have detailed contingency plans at hand," Chien said.
The minister said the government would ensure that oil supplies remain stable and any likely negative impact on the nation's economic growth diverted.
The ministry would also work to ensure safety of Taiwanese based in the Middle East and the Gulf region should a US-led coalition launch a military strike on Iraq, Chien added.
Over 3,000 Taiwanese reside in Middle Eastern and Gulf countries,according to ministry's estimates. Around 2,500 of them are based in Saudi Arabia.
The foreign minister said it's unlikely that Taiwan would be involved militarily in a war against Iraq.
He also reiterated the government's willingness to take part in the humanitarian aid effort to Iraqis in the aftermath of a war, although he declined to elaborate on plans in this regard.
But in view of the divided world opinion about an attack on Iraq, a ministry official, speaking on condition of anonymity, said Taipei would be much more cautious in offering any assistance to an Iraqi war as compared to its previous assistance in the Afghan conflict.
Vice Minister of Foreign Affairs Michael Kau (
The meeting yesterday afternoon was hosted by Vice Premier Lin Hsin-yi (
"While Taiwan in general supports a war against terrorism -- as terrorism poses as an uncivilized way to reach one's political objective -- we also notice that world opinion in the case of Iraq remains rather divided," Kau said.
A group of Taiwanese-American and Tibetan-American students at Harvard University on Saturday disrupted Chinese Ambassador to the US Xie Feng’s (謝鋒) speech at the school, accusing him of being responsible for numerous human rights violations. Four students — two Taiwanese Americans and two from Tibet — held up banners inside a conference hall where Xie was delivering a speech at the opening ceremony of the Harvard Kennedy School China Conference 2024. In a video clip provided by the Coalition of Students Resisting the CCP (Chinese Communist Party), Taiwanese-American Cosette Wu (吳亭樺) and Tibetan-American Tsering Yangchen are seen holding banners that together read:
UNAWARE: Many people sit for long hours every day and eat unhealthy foods, putting them at greater risk of developing one of the ‘three highs,’ an expert said More than 30 percent of adults aged 40 or older who underwent a government-funded health exam were unaware they had at least one of the “three highs” — high blood pressure, high blood lipids or high blood sugar, the Health Promotion Administration (HPA) said yesterday. Among adults aged 40 or older who said they did not have any of the “three highs” before taking the health exam, more than 30 percent were found to have at least one of them, Adult Preventive Health Examination Service data from 2022 showed. People with long-term medical conditions such as hypertension or diabetes usually do not
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Heat advisories were in effect for nine administrative regions yesterday afternoon as warm southwesterly winds pushed temperatures above 38°C in parts of southern Taiwan, the Central Weather Administration (CWA) said. As of 3:30pm yesterday, Tainan’s Yujing District (玉井) had recorded the day’s highest temperature of 39.7°C, though the measurement will not be included in Taiwan’s official heat records since Yujing is an automatic rather than manually operated weather station, the CWA said. Highs recorded in other areas were 38.7°C in Kaohsiung’s Neimen District (內門), 38.2°C in Chiayi City and 38.1°C in Pingtung’s Sandimen Township (三地門), CWA data showed. The spell of scorching